Am I suppose to believe that Sonny and Will are so stupid that they never considered that Gabi would need to move to a place that has a real market for modeling? Or is Salem the new fashion hotbed? :rolleyes: this whole story is so boring. People have to move for work all the time in this country. They work it out. What's the big deal?

Re: the italicized...you're supposed to believe that Will and Sonny foolishly trust Gabi enough to believe that she would never even consider taking poor Arianna away from a loving father for no other reason than to pursue a modeling career that she was insisting a few weeks ago that she no longer cared about and that she definitely didn't consider to be nearly as important as doing what was right for Arianna. And that they especially believe that if there were some glaringly important detail of the contract that they had every right to know -- like, oh, I don't know, the part about her moving Arianna to a strange new city, far away from the many loving family members that Arianna has in Salem, not to mention Arianna's father -- that Gabi would be a decent enough human being to share that information with them right away instead of being shady and evasive about the whole thing because she knows that what she is considering is wrong.

As for Gabi[...][she's] a young mother, and should pursue this opportunity. She is not tied to Will. Arianna is young enough to make such a move without much trauma. Will and Sonny can visit and also have dual custody. I just don't see the big deal, and the story is a non story to me.

It's kind of late, but I still feel the need to step on my soapbox and comment on this -- especially the bolded portion. :soapbox:

Whether Gabi likes it or not, she is tied to Will for the next eighteen years, if not the rest of her life, through Arianna. Being a parent is about putting the child first and always doing what's in their best interest. I'm not even a parent and I know that, so why doesn't Gabi?

It simply isn't in Arianna's best interest for Gabi to selfishly rip the child away from a loving father (not to mention the many other loving family members in Salem who are more than happy to help Gabi and Will raise Arianna) to pursue her own suddenly resurfaced "dream" to be a model in a strange new city that she's completely unfamiliar with and will have no support system in (oh -- other than babysitters and child care services -- complete strangers, in other words -- that the modeling agency -- again filled with complete strangers -- provides her with, of course).

In principle, yes, I agree with the contention that many "modern" families live apart and shuttle kids back and forth all of the time. They do so for a number of different reasons, but it's never ideal, and none of those reasons apply in this case. Gabi and Will get along with each other, Will has repeatedly expressed his desire for Arianna to not be shuffled back and forth between homes because he was raised in a similar manner and wants a better life for his daughter, and Gabi doesn't need to take Arianna and move many states -- not cities, but states -- away from Will to pursue a career or be with a husband or other family members. She doesn't even need to do so for financial reasons, even though it would certainly be a career-based move. She just wants to. There's a very big difference.

At the moment, I see no way for Gabi to come out of this looking like anything other than a fickle, selfish person who cares more about pursuing her own dream -- one that I will reiterate that she was insisting a few weeks ago that she no longer cared about and would certainly never put ahead of Arianna's needs -- than she does about letting Arianna be raised by both of her parents. Twelve visits to Salem a year to see Will (based on one of the terms of the contract that Justin revealed in this episode) is nothing compared to the daily "visits" that Arianna currently gets with her father. It doesn't matter if Arianna is young or not -- that time is priceless, and Gabi's considering depriving Arianna and Will of it for completely selfish reasons.

That said, I do agree that the story is a bit of a "non-story" -- we all know that it's just another one of Nick's manipulations, and that's another reason that the whole thing annoys me, because I can't stand it when Will and Sonny get sucked into that homophobic creep's orbit. But it is what it is, and Gabi certainly isn't the good guy (or girl, in this case) here.